The next few days felt careful. They weren’t walking on eggshells around each other, but they all seemed to be hyper-aware of each others’ presence in the house.
Ioan and May called out from their performances and, when A Finger Pointing asked why, May had spent half an hour locked in the bedroom on a silenced sensorium conversation. Ioan received a very sincere note soon after wishing both em and True Name well. While she’d never spent much time worrying about the things True Name did, A Finger Pointing’s tireless desire to be friends with everyone did not exclude her cross-tree instance.
For her part, True Name spent much of the first day silent in her room, though whether that was to sleep or salvage the situation, ey couldn’t tell. She poked her head out around dinner and said that she was too tired to join and that she would see them in the morning.
Ey couldn’t blame her. Even with the two hour nap before lunch, Ioan felt groggy and disoriented for the remainder of the day. I’m becoming like May, ey thought. I don’t sleep well alone, or even separated by camp bed frames.
All three of them slept in late the next morning, only rising at nine or so when Ioan received the gentlest possible sensorium ping from True Name.
Ey found her in the kitchen, standing in front of the coffee machine, looking baffled.
“I am sorry if I woke you, my dear. There are more buttons on this than I know what to do with.”
“It’s alright. I went through a coffee phase years ago and wound up with this. I usually just tap here…then here…and then this last one for three cups.”
She bowed. “Thank you. I would complain, but it does make good coffee.”
The skunk looked so much like eir partner that ey had to stop emself from reaching out to ruffle her ears. Ey disguised the motion as leaning back against the counter and rubbing the sleep from eir eyes. “Good coffee’s a necessity. Sleep alright?”
“Well enough, yes. It has been a few days since this instance has had the chance, so it was starting to build up.”
“Days? Good Lord. I don’t know how you can do that.”
“Anxiety, coffee, and 263 years of practice.”
Ey laughed. “I don’t know, I think it might be a you thing. May seems pretty fond of it.”
“An improvement, then,” she said, grinning. “Mugs?”
Ey showed her where they kept the mugs, then the cream and sugar for doctoring coffee and spoons for stirring. Once the pot finished brewing and all three cups had been poured, ey excused emself back to the bedroom with eirs and May’s coffee to finish waking up with eir partner.
And so it continued. They would speak in the morning and over dinner, perhaps a few times throughout the day, but otherwise, they worked on their own projects. They’d say good morning to each other, say good night to each other, say polite things in passing. Little of it felt like it was done out of kindness, but rather out of a need to remain cognizant of each others’ presence.
Even the weather felt careful. The snow first melted and then was replaced when a new storm lay down a delicate few inches.
It wasn’t until the third full day since their return that the spell was broken, when, shortly after lunch, True Name stepped into her field of view, bowed, and politely requested a conversation with May.
The skunk frowned and beckoned her over to the couch.
True Name apologized to Ioan, then set up a cone of silence with secure visual ACLs.
Three days was just long enough to start building up habits, such that Ioan was left anxious and jittery when they were broken. Seeing it from the outside for the first time, ey was left with a slight sense of disorientation from the way the cone blurred both the occupants and the background, the edges of its boundaries unnervingly sharp.
There was nothing to be gained from watching the indistinct shapes within. A quiet conversation had them simply looking like two black forms against the relative brightness of the balcony. Ey couldn’t see expressions, couldn’t see but the most grandiose of body language.
And yet ey watched, slipping over to the kitchen to clean, or at least dream up some chore that needed doing there, just so that ey could keep an eye on the cone.
It was boring, and that it was boring only drove eir anxiety higher.
The conversation lasted nearly an hour, and when the cone dropped, ey was greeted once again by the sight of the two skunks. To say that neither looked happy missed the mark: True Name had a dullness to her expression, something between resignation and hopelessness, while May looked apoplectic. She’d clearly been crying quite hard at one point.
Ey ducked around the kitchen counter as quickly as ey could. “May? True Name? Are you–“
May waved a hand dismissively and blipped out of the sim. There was a sensorium ping a moment later, a view of Arrowhead Lake.
“What just happened?”
True Name shrugged, the movement looking as though she was struggling against dozens of gravities rather than just one. “I explained what has been happening.”
Ey frowned, feeling eir own anger rise out of anxiety. “Well? What’s been happening? I don’t exactly like seeing her that upset.”
“No, I suppose not.” She sighed and slouched against the back of the couch, rubbing at her forehead. “I explained the shift between Jonas and I over the last twenty-five years. I explained the last few weeks.”
“And pissed her off.”
She rolled her head to the side, enough get a sidelong glance at em. “I am sorry, Ioan. I cannot be the only one to know these things. I have had all of my existing support removed. All of my forks, all of my cocladists, most of my friends. It is small consolation, I am sure, but I have left May Then My Name angrier at Jonas than I think she ever was at me.”
Ey blinked and straightened up. “At Jonas?”
She let her head slip back down off the back of the couch, looking down at her paws. “I cannot tell you, Ioan. Not yet.”
“Nothing?” Ey shook eir head. “Sorry, True Name, I’m not asking you to betray a secret or anything. I’m just worried.”
“I understand, my dear.” There seemed to be more coming, but she sat for another minute or so, just staring down at her paws on her lap.
“I’m sorry, True N–“
“What was it that he said to you? ‘Sometimes mommies and daddies fight’?”
“Wait, but…what?”
She shrugged again, slowly rolled up off the couch to her feet, swayed for a moment, then walked off to her room, the door snicking shut behind her.